UNITED WAY OF SOUTH CENTRAL INDIANA

We are working every day to engage people and organizations in innovative solutions to help transform lives in our community. We aim for a stronger community, with jobs that pay a livable wage, good schools and a healthy environment.

Our Volunteers work alongside us to assist us in fulfilling our mission, enrich our programs and build our capacity. We have partnerships that provide multiple free resources that provide health care, food, shelter, employment and literacy to those in need in our community. Our Community Partners help us to engage our constituents and build our capacity to service the community we live and work in. As we progress into the future we are looking to add new partnerships to our organization, enabling additional community engagement.

We provide information to the communities of Lawrence and Orange Counties Indiana to access substance abuse programs, receive quality health care and access nutritious food. We are fighting to help everyone obtain good health and remain healthy.

We accomplish our mission through our programs and assist in funding local membership agencies. These membership agencies have missions and programs that align with United Way of South Central Indiana. We improve lives by mobilizing the caring power of our community to advance the common good. We accomplish this by providing small grants to Lawrence and Orange County Indiana community nonprofits.

We support local nonprofit organization events year round such as the Bedford Senior Fair and Bertha's Mission, a local food bank.

As an affiliate of Dolly Parton's Imagination Library, we send local children aged birth to five free age-appropriate books. We're helping children with the tools to learn and grow, and young adults to thrive in the job market.

We have partnered with the local school district, North Lawrence Community Schools, to provide funding for childhood education, and to initiate STEM education in Preschool. Our goal is to obtain funding for children enrolled in grades K-6 for Childhood STEM education.

We have an active and engaged Board of Directors that assist in building our organization. United Way of South Central Indiana was originally established in 1956. With 50 + years of community engagement we are capable of maintaining and expanding upon our existing community partnerships. We can continue to provide resources for financial assistance, food, shelter, health, and education with the assistance of our partners, with grant funding and with new program initiatives.

Our goal is to assist North Lawrence Community Schools in Indiana begin a STEM program for children enrolled in grades K-6. STEM education focuses on hands-on activities that teach science, technology, engineering, and math in an interdisciplinary approach.

The hands-on approach to STEM education is helping educators foster a deeper passion in children for science, technology, and mathematics.

As the United Way network continues to evolve, United Way of South Central Indiana (UWSCI) re-imagines its services to support our local community. In 2020, UWSCI delivered five key services to support the community utilizing the new Modern United Way framework. The framework is the next iteration of the Bold Plays: to execute on a donor-centric business model, create great individual experiences, reignite strategic corporate relationships, drive transformational giving, and work as one network. We supported this work through mobilizing teams, comprehensive board training, impact work, and key programming that supports both small and large organizations.

Every year United Way of South Central Indiana disseminates funding for small community grants, we provide funding for basic needs, we provide discounts for prescriptions, we provide after school programming for boys and girls, free literary resources for young children to assist in expanding their educational opportunities, our disaster volunteer leaders provide direct services during large and small scale disasters, we provide access to wellness and health care, we provide meals, social and physical activities for senior citizens, and we provide free confidential assistance for victims of domestic violence. Our future goals include expanding upon the capacity of our existing programs, implementing new programs, and adding to the list of free resources that United Way of South Central Indiana provides.

Our 2020 Impact In 2020 United Way of South Central Indiana added two new programs.
1. The Preschool STE(A)M Program We partnered with the North Lawrence Community Schools to implement *STEAM learning (*Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Math) in the preschool setting.
2. The Childhood Development STEM Program We partnered with North Lawrence Community Schools to implement STEM education for children in grade school through high school, with hands-on lessons in science, technology, engineering, and math in an interdisciplinary approach.

Our 2020 Initiatives
Over $600,000 in grant funding awarded. All of those funds are locally disbursed to our community partners, small local nonprofit organizations, and to fund our programs and initiatives.

Initiated an ACEs School Research Fund for a local study of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). Adverse Childhood Experiences can negatively impact an entire community. Our goal is to provide resources for families in need to cope with a wide-range of adverse family issues.

Initiated the Young Women United Scholarship Fund. The goal of this Mentoring program is to Empower, Educate, and Engage High School aged young women in our community.